"Stop!" Dustin yelled, as Will and Jonathan made their way up the stairs.
"No you stop!" Lucas shot back as the two continued to play fight.
The boys had just spent the past five hours playing their annual Christmas Eve campaign, although this one had way to many loose ends in the story. This was very unusual for Mike, as his Christmas Eve campaigns were often his best, but this year his heart just wasn't in it.
Lucas and Dustin were still wrestling, slowly making their way upstairs. Mike ignored their shenanigans, and instead turned his attention to the blanket fort he'd built over a month ago. He felt that same familiar pain tugging at his stomach, that hole that was left inside him.
"Eleven..." He whispered as he approached the fort.
Even a month later, he could still remember everything about that fateful week. He remembered sneaking her eggos for breakfast. He remembered her saving his life at the quarry. He remembered their kiss in the cafeteria. During the daytime, he could at least remember the good things that happened that week.
But at night, there was no escaping the nightmares. At night, he would remember the terror he felt as the creature advanced on them. He'd remember being pushed away as he tried to stop El, being held in place. He remembered her eyes, they were... wrong. They weren't the beautiful brown eyes he was used to, they were blood red. He remembered her blood-curdling screams of agony. And he remembered her disappearing. Gone without a trace. He'd never know what happened to her. That hurt him in ways he couldn't explain.
And he had looked for her, they all had. Mike, Will, Lucas, Dustin and Nancy spent days looking for her. They searched all over Mirkwood, but there was no sign of Eleven. The others gave up the search after two weeks, but Mike looked for her everyday for nearly a month, until he too realized that even if she didn't die in the classroom, there was no way anyone could survive for a month in the brutal cold. Mike knew he'd failed her yet again.
But what hurt him the most, was knowing he'd broken his promise. He's promised her they'd go to the Snow Ball together. That she'd stay with him and his family. That she'd have her own bed to sleep in. That she could have all the eggos her heart desired. But the Snow Ball had come and gone, and El was lost to him forever.
"El," he choked out as his tears started to fall. "El, I'm sorry. I wasn't strong enough to save you." He fell to his knees in front of the fort, no longer trying to fight the tears. "If I had just taken you away from the school, the bad men wouldn't have found you. If I could have found you before it was too late. If I... I..." he trailed off, breaking down into sobs, crawling into the fort and clutching El's pillow for dear life.
He wasn't sure how long he laid there, but when he had run out of tears, he found that Dustin and Lucas had snuck out the door and gone home. Mike set about cleaning up the mess that was left over, hoping that would take his mind off of... other things. This was of course in vain. She never left his mind.
When he finally emerged from the basement, his father was fast asleep in his La-Z-Boy. His mother was in the kitchen, putting away the leftovers. Nancy was on the couch with Steve, cuddled under a blanket.
Mike intentionally avoided all of them, and made his way upstairs to his room. When he got upstairs, he heard Nancy's radio playing. He listened for just a few moments, then went in her room to turn it off. He walked into his room, laid on his bed, and cried himself to sleep, the words of the song still ringing in his head.
I'm sorry for all the lies I told you.
I'm sorry for the things I didn't say.
More than anything else, I'm sorry for myself
'Cause you're not here with me.